In this installment, Cleopatra Mathis reads “The Tyger” by William Blake. Mathis's sixth book of poems, White Sea, will be published in 2005 by Sarabande Books. She is the recipient of many grants and awards, including two National Endowment for the Arts grants, a fellowship from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, The Robert Frost Award, and The Peter Lavin Award for Younger Poets from the Academy of American Poets. She has taught English and Creative Writing at Dartmouth College since 1982.

William Blake, "The Tyger"

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night.
What Immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, and what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? and what dread feet?

What the hammer? What the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright,
In the forests of the night.
What Immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?